iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

My iPhone 5 uses cellular data even when connected to wifi. I've included snippets from by bill below showing once a hour data usage even when I am at home with the phone connected to wifi. Although some periods show data usage while I was home asleep, other periods were while I was awake and using the wifi with another computer so I know my home network was working during this time. Apple has released a patch for this exact issue for iPhone 5 on Verizon (http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5526) and Verizon has even offered to pay for data overages (http://money.cnn.com/2012/10/01/technology/iphone-5-data-overage/index.html). When I contacted ATT support I was told that this type of data usage was normal when using wifi since the iPhone 5 was advanced and used data at all times, even when associated with wifi networks. The suggested fix was that I disable cellular data to avoid charges. This answer is unacceptable to me since it defeats the purpose of owning a smart phone in the first place and overlooks an issue that Apple and Verizon are actively working to solve. When can ATT iPhone users expect a patch for this bug?

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

I have a 4S and I am also experiencing the same problem. I have been keeping an eye all week here while connected to my company's network (major fashion retailer headquearters that won't be down at any second). While streaming xm radio via wifi I have seen activity sent and received; 10.KB and 8.0KB today, over 25KB yesterday and so on.Regardless of whose fault it is, Apple of AT&T, it needs to be addressed. I have been forced to switch off cellular data on my phone because I keep going over my basic data plan. I refuse to upgrade to a different plan since I almost never use it. I spend my life at the office or home where I have WIFI.

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

edroblesjr wrote:I have a 4S and I am also experiencing the same problem. I have been keeping an eye all week here while connected to my company's network (major fashion retailer headquearters that won't be down at any second). While streaming xm radio via wifi I have seen activity sent and received; 10.KB and 8.0KB today, over 25KB yesterday and so on.Regardless of whose fault it is, Apple of AT&T, it needs to be addressed. I have been forced to switch off cellular data on my phone because I keep going over my basic data plan. I refuse to upgrade to a different plan since I almost never use it. I spend my life at the office or home where I have WIFI.

If the phone goes into hibernation - aka the screen goes dark the wifi radio is turned off by hardware design, a wifi connection is not required for the normal use of the phone so it is turned off to conserve battery. The switch is seamless so you streaming is not disrupted.

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

wingrider01 wrote:

edroblesjr wrote:I have a 4S and I am also experiencing the same problem. I have been keeping an eye all week here while connected to my company's network (major fashion retailer headquearters that won't be down at any second). While streaming xm radio via wifi I have seen activity sent and received; 10.KB and 8.0KB today, over 25KB yesterday and so on.Regardless of whose fault it is, Apple of AT&T, it needs to be addressed. I have been forced to switch off cellular data on my phone because I keep going over my basic data plan. I refuse to upgrade to a different plan since I almost never use it. I spend my life at the office or home where I have WIFI.

If the phone goes into hibernation - aka the screen goes dark the wifi radio is turned off by hardware design, a wifi connection is not required for the normal use of the phone so it is turned off to conserve battery. The switch is seamless so you streaming is not disrupted.

If this is the case then how come only 5K were received as opposed to a few gigs since I have heard to at least 3 hours of continued XM radio. Also, what about cell data being sent and received in the middle of the night? I don't have any apps that automatically connect, in fact I have deleted everything except XM and this continues to happen.

Not to mention that this wasn't an issue a few months back... I have owned Iphones on AT&T since the 3 came out and I have had the same plan since then; I started going over my plan a few months ago, much like EVERY person that is posting in this thread.

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

[ Edited ]

edroblesjr wrote:

wingrider01 wrote:

edroblesjr wrote:I have a 4S and I am also experiencing the same problem. I have been keeping an eye all week here while connected to my company's network (major fashion retailer headquearters that won't be down at any second). While streaming xm radio via wifi I have seen activity sent and received; 10.KB and 8.0KB today, over 25KB yesterday and so on.Regardless of whose fault it is, Apple of AT&T, it needs to be addressed. I have been forced to switch off cellular data on my phone because I keep going over my basic data plan. I refuse to upgrade to a different plan since I almost never use it. I spend my life at the office or home where I have WIFI.

If the phone goes into hibernation - aka the screen goes dark the wifi radio is turned off by hardware design, a wifi connection is not required for the normal use of the phone so it is turned off to conserve battery. The switch is seamless so you streaming is not disrupted.

If this is the case then how come only 5K were received as opposed to a few gigs since I have heard to at least 3 hours of continued XM radio. Also, what about cell data being sent and received in the middle of the night? I don't have any apps that automatically connect, in fact I have deleted everything except XM and this continues to happen.

Not to mention that this wasn't an issue a few months back... I have owned Iphones on AT&T since the 3 came out and I have had the same plan since then; I started going over my plan a few months ago, much like EVERY person that is posting in this thread.

Your hibernation theory holds no water.

Believe what you want to, have used an app that identifies cellular vs wi-fi data usage at the app level. This is a sandboxed Iphone 5 that has absolutely nothing on it outside of the data sniffer and the Apple supplied apps. There are numerous Apple supplied apps that automaticly run in the background that will consume cellular data.

In addition have verified that the wi-fi radio is switched off when the phone goes into hibernation utilizing a commercial network sniffer and a app that consumes data. The unique wifi MAC address of the phone shows up in the sniffer trace while the phone is active, approximately 30 seconds after the phone drops into hibernation mode that unique MAC address drops from the trace of the network, indicating that the wifi radio has been switched off and then any subsequent data transfer is done on the cellular network. A visible indication of this can be seen by watching for the wifi connected symbol on the phone when it comes out of hibernation - it takes a second or so for the connected indicator to show up on a phone that just came out of hibernation mode

Have not had a need to purchase a GSM network sniffer / analyzer but with the next project that the team is starting the RFP does indicate that cellular data usage will need to be monitored for specifc reasons, so might just have one in a few months

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

bondgrl wrote:

So .....can you give any advice about what to do? Turn the phone off completely ?

that is really up to you, you can use the app that I listed to find out what the biggest culprits are and determine if they are really what you need. Personnally I can;t turn off my phones, I am on call 7x24x365. As far as wifi turning off on hibernation that is set by the phone manufacturer.

I rarely put anything on the phone that is not original app, I use it for email, text and calls. If I want to listen to the radio I have Sirius XM in the cars and a Sirius XM Lynx. The only additional two apps I have on the phone is my bankng app and a on demand weather. I also terminate all apps when I am done with them.

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

[ Edited ]

I believe I have just started experiencing this same issue. Our billing cycle restarted on the 27th, by the 28th one of my iphones got an alert that we have "used" 65% of the data for the month. This phone has been used for 17 months on the same plan without ever having any overages for excess data use. The 300mb plan has been more than enough for this phone user since we purchased the phone! This made me go to my bill details online and I discover that my other iphone is experiencing the same issue. A HUGE increase in the amount of data being used. This seems to have started abruptly between two billing cycles and the terminology has chaged to call all my data use "Roaming Web" usage. I spent over 2.5 hours on the phone with customer service, who attempted to tell me that my plan was not sufficient (trying to sell me on a larger data plan) and to take the phone to a CORE store. Then I find information on-line that leads me to believe that EVERY ONE of the FOUR people I spoke with at ATT customer service likely know this is a problem and have been trained to pretend they have never heard of this issue. I have been a Cingular/ATT customer for over 15 years. In this time we have never paid a single bill late and never missed a payment. So, roughly 12k dollars and many years later I can't believe that we are even having to take the time out of our day to deal with this.

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

albaucom83 wrote:

I believe I have just started experiencing this same issue. Our billing cycle restarted on the 27th, by the 28th one of my iphones got an alert that we have "used" 65% of the data for the month. This phone has been used for 17 months on the same plan without ever having any overages for excess data use. The 300mb plan has been more than enough for this phone user since we purchased the phone! This made me go to my bill details online and I discover that my other iphone is experiencing the same issue. A HUGE increase in the amount of data being used. This seems to have started abruptly between two billing cycles and the terminology has chaged to call all my data use "Roaming Web" usage. I spent over 2.5 hours on the phone with customer service, who attempted to tell me that my plan was not sufficient (trying to sell me on a larger data plan) and to take the phone to a CORE store. Then I find information on-line that leads me to believe that EVERY ONE of the FOUR people I spoke with at ATT customer service likely know this is a problem and have been trained to pretend they have never heard of this issue. I have been a Cingular/ATT customer for over 15 years. In this time we have never paid a single bill late and never missed a payment. So, roughly 12k dollars and many years later I can't believe that we are even having to take the time out of our day to deal with this.

question - are you streaming music? If so the minute your Iphone goes into hibernation - plugged into a charger or not, the wi-fi turns off to conserve battey and the cellulal radio takes over, this is by engineer design at apple. Until recently the wi-fi would stay on when the phone was in hibernation and plugged into a charger, one of the recent IOS upgrades that apple puched out changed this

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

Mnguyenn wrote:I've found out not too long ago that AT&T now requires for you to turn off your "cellular data" while you're using wifi! Sounds ridiculous and annoying I know, but it saves you that $10 fee.

Whenever you know you're going to use wifi, head on over to your settings<general<cellular<turn off cellular to strictly use wifi.

While your cellular data is turned off, I don't think you can receive text messages at this time. Boo AT&T.

Sorry this is FUD, leave my cellular data on 7x24x365 and never have exceeded my limits, but then I disabled facebook and all the social sites, use a Sirius portable radio to stream music and a genie-go to watch movies, I used a app by Onavo Mobile to determine what apps where utilizing cellular data and adjusted them or deleted them if they wherer fluff.

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

I am copying what I just posted over on the Apple forum in a similar thread:

After two days on iOS7, I still see the same problems....if you leave cellular on while on wifi, it uses cellular data, as well as the 1:23 AM, 2:23 AM, 3:23 AM data transmissions when the phone is asleep.

So Very Discouraged!!!

All of the well-intentioned suggestions about tracking data to discover the culprit, etc., are really of no use. Having used various models of iPhones for several years on AT&T with no problems, this overnight and significant change in data usage is simply unacceptable.

And turning off cellular everytime you go into Wifi areas is, excuse me, ridiculous. You can't even access your voicemail.

I have been too busy to try to demand an accommodation with AT&T for this (and hoping someone out there will fix it first!), but with three iPhones on my account, I may have to try what Lead_Rain was able to accomplish with Verizon. (this was: demand that Verizon take back his iPhone and get a Motorola phone instead).

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

This has been going on for years I can see and it's absurd. My wife gets a 5c for christmas, running iOS 7, she NEVER turns on mobile net or internet and is always at work or home on WIFI. Our WIFI runs 24/7 .. movies, etc. never a problem.

I discovered that for the past 6 days at 1:53 AM her phone is DLing data. Same time of night, varying amounts of DATA. Call ATT ? no problem. "Your WiFi must not be working properly "

This is nonsense. All my other phones have unlimited data plans, so I never even looked at this before.

This is unacceptable and it's not my job to fix it ! Just UNACCEPTABLE !

Re: iPhone 5 cellular data charges while using wifi

lbhough wrote:

This has been going on for years I can see and it's absurd. My wife gets a 5c for christmas, running iOS 7, she NEVER turns on mobile net or internet and is always at work or home on WIFI. Our WIFI runs 24/7 .. movies, etc. never a problem.

I discovered that for the past 6 days at 1:53 AM her phone is DLing data. Same time of night, varying amounts of DATA. Call ATT ? no problem. "Your WiFi must not be working properly "

This is nonsense. All my other phones have unlimited data plans, so I never even looked at this before.

This is unacceptable and it's not my job to fix it ! Just UNACCEPTABLE !

If the phone goes into hiberation. plugged in or no it will turn off the wifi portion and switch to cellular data, this is a feature designed by the manufacturer to conserve battery usage since wifi is not required for the device to function as a phone